adjust
by starskipper
Summary: His clothes... don't fit. He's more upset about this than he probably should be. (a drabble set directly after child's play for fluffiness and for profit)


_I'm rewatching this whole series with a friend of mine and we just got to this episode and in the middle of writing Powersurge's last chapter my brain went "you have to write something super dorky and sweet Right This Instant Right Now" so i did_

 _thanks for your patience, y'all vo_

* * *

His clothes… don't fit.

He's more upset about this than he probably should be.

Lloyd grumbles, a sort of growl in the back of his throat (he can do that now, kinda, though it tends to squeak in and out, which is _annoying_ ), and tosses his favourite hoodie onto the floor. That thing had been with him ever since he stole it and painted those cool bones on it the first week he was at Darkley's. Now he can't even get his arms through the sleeves, and he can barely zip it up. Lloyd doesn't even… have that many clothes? Like, aside from the gi. But they're all on the floor, now. He squirms in the oversized pajama shirt Kai lent him, uncomfortable with how vividly he can remember literally swimming in it like two days ago.

This is weird. He said he was fine with whatever brand of tea magic was thrown at him, but maybe he should have thought that one through before agreeing.

Lloyd joins the clothes on the floor, banging his knee up against the side of the bed in the process. _That's_ annoying and weird, too. He keeps hitting things with his elbows, or knees or whatever. He's gonna bruise.

His clothes smell familiar. Kai's shirt, on the other hand, does not. That's _another_ thing, is he keeps getting yanked into something completely unfamiliar and weird and new and he has to get used to it because wuh destiny wuuh can't go back! Whatever.

Lloyd might be sulking a little bit. He's been going through these for an hour at least. But, like, it's hard to leave things behind, when he gets attached to them. Maybe he should stop doing that. (It'd be hard, too, though.)

Trying not to get himself tangled in his own limbs, Lloyd rolls himself onto his knees and bundles his old clothes into his arms. He's not super ready to just throw these in the trash yet, so he shoves the pile under his bed. He _ignores_ how he smacks the back of his head on the way out.

He wanders through the halls and into the kitchen aimlessly, curling his toes at how many crumbs he can feel under his bare feet (his shoes are too small, now, too). Someone should sweep in here. Not him, though. He's gonna get a snack to distract himself and probably get more crumbs on the floor. Curiously, Lloyd boosts himself onto the counter (by himself!) and opens the cupboard next to his nose. Cans, mostly. Some bowls, a chipped mug. Boring. He closes that one, and opens the one on the other side. More bowls, some plates, and a - ohhhhhh my gosh.

There's a jar full of candy in the very back on the top shelf.

How has he _never_ seen that before.

Lloyd stretches a hand up and taps around the bottom of the jar before actually getting his legs under him and rising up to eye level with it. He reaches in with both hands, pulls a little too hard, and ends up falling backwards back onto his butt, crouched like a gargoyle with his sweet prize.

He tucks his legs into his chest to hold the jar against himself at close range, and digs around for whatever sticks to his hand first. Man, sugar is always a fix-all for your problems.

Wait a second, what the-

Lloyd squints at his blurry reflection in the glass lid of the jar. Pushing the stick of his lollipop to the side, he turns his face closer and pulls a bit under his eyelid to see clearer. Is th - is that green? In his eye? What the heck?

The bottom corner of his left iris is starting to physically bleed green, turning the transition spot between it and his natural red an ugly sort of brownish. Not the pretty brownish, like Cole's, like the one that looks like bad mud (not good mud).

He lets go and leans backwards a bit dramatically, with a matching " _ugh_ " muffled only slightly by the candy. Okay, cool! So, everything is changing all at once. What's next, black hair? ...Actually, ew, he doesn't like that mental image.

So, maybe sugar isn't a _fix-all,_ but it's a _help-all._ The fact that his own eyes are rebelling against him is cushioned by his sneaky ninja-candy-raid. It's not like his dad told him the color was a part of his heritage, or a reminder of him, or anything mushy about love, or anything.

...It's maybe a little like that.

Lloyd tosses the lollipop stick in the sink and stuffs a taffy in his mouth.

"Using your newfound powers for evil?"

Lloyd makes a very ungainly "eep!" and jumps backwards so far he smacks his head ( _AGAIN_ ) into the cupboard. Nya's hand shoots to her mouth in a gesture that's simultaneously amused and surprised.

"Nya!" Lloyd says, muffled, "don' tell unclwu. Ijussfound thish. Sh'not evil."

"Uh huh," she says, hopping up onto the counter next to him. "Hey, if you're gonna be a rapscallion, let me have one of those toffees Cole buys."

"This is Cole's candy?"

"Nah, it's just the public stash."

"Oh." Well, if it's public, it's definitely not stealing or for evil, then. After all, he's public. He thinks. Lloyd hands Nya a gold-wrapped toffee, which she unwraps with one hand and pops into her mouth.

Nya leans back on the cupboards behind her, not saying anything, just watching the ceiling and munching the toffee. At least Nya's not acting weird around him, like he's fragile or something, like the ninja are doing (not on purpose, of course. It's just… different. You can't toss a kid almost as tall as Jay into the air and catch him without dropping him _and_ you, now can you? Well, I guess you can. But it's not your first instinct).

(And honestly, it's taking Nya a lot to consciously _avoid_ watching him like he's made of glass. She was _informed,_ a good ten minutes before they came back to the ship, that, and I quote, 'tea magic from some witch or something made green bean older and now he's acting rly jumpy and he doesn't rly like being touched so when we come home just dont be too surprised ok also can u grab my pajama shirt n whoevers shorts are in the wash rn thx ill give u the rundown later', via Kai. The rundown was somehow even less coherent.)

Nya should probably say something wise-ish. Like, morally uplifting, or something. Instead, she goes: "Hey, you should take a shower or something, kiddo."

"Whg- why?"

"You smell like Grundle spit?"

"Nya!"

"Well, you _do!_ " Nya gestures wildly with her hand. "All five of you do. And none of you have showered yet. I swear, Zane is the only one who is willing to at least _try_ wearing that scented body mist I got for winter holiday last year."

"So _that's_ why he smells like cookies…" Lloyd muses.

"Vanilla Sugar Snow, to be precise. I think it's too strong, but he likes it. See the problem there though is that he doesn't need it."

"I would try it. Then I could smell cookies all day, instead of boring ol' nothing."

"Well, it kinda wears off on your own nose. So if _you_ wanted to smell it, you'd have to keep putting it on. But then you'd probably turn into a cookie yourself, and Cole'd eatcha."

"No he wouldn't!" Lloyd's voice squeaks, and Nya is struck by the silly realization that he really is just the same nine-year-old in a teenager's body, and he might _actually_ be ever-so-slightly afraid that Cole would try to eat him.

"He would."

Lloyd throws a hard candy at her.

She responds by poking his face and distracting him while she steals another toffee from the jar in his hands.

"So, how old are you now? Like, fourteen?"

Lloyd sobers. "Iunno. How old's everyone else?"

"'Bout fourteen, fifteen."

"I guess I'm fourteen then?"

"Ehhh. Let's make it thirteen."

"Why?"

"So you're still younger than me, duh. I gotta have a bratty little brother. Though, I just gotta say, even if you were two hundred, I'd still be older than you. Don't you forget it."

"That's not how that works!"

" _You're_ not how that works, bucko!"

He throws another hard candy at her. It bounces to the floor.

Nya makes a face halfway between a scowl and a grin, scrunching up her nose at Lloyd's muted snickering. He pulls his shirt up to swipe at his face, which has a smear of sugar on it from who-knows-when.

She should probably say something wise-ish, and comforting, and understanding (because she _does,_ in a way, sort of), but that can come later. Instead, she says: "Go get in the shower, punk."


End file.
